


The Stains of Time

by joufancyhuh



Series: The Heavens Will Fall [6]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hurt/comfort fic, Post ME3, merweek 2017, rape mention, underage mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 12:58:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11127447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joufancyhuh/pseuds/joufancyhuh
Summary: Blake Shepard had a lot of nightmares before, but this one's different. This one's real.





	The Stains of Time

**Author's Note:**

> Mass Effect Relationship Week 2017: Day 3  
> Late Night Confessions

Blake thrashes around in her sleep again. She’s mumbling and whining under her breath as her legs kick out from under her, her arms punching and waving wildly. Sweat is soaking through her clothes, another pair of pajamas with one time use before throwing them back into the wash. Kaidan knows what to do by now; he ducks her arms and dodges her legs as he scoots in closer, attempting to wrap himself around her to keep her still. Sometimes she quiets down immediately, but not tonight. Tonight this makes her work harder, and she throws her head back into Kaidan’s face, a sickening crunch as she makes contact.

Kaidan ignores the feel of blood running down his lips, using his head to push hers down into the pillow. Her cheeks are wet from crying in her sleep, and he hugs her tighter to him. “Wake up,” he coos. “Temp, you’re safe. You gotta wake up.” Blood from his nose drips onto her face, running down to stain the white pillow that cradles her head. She moans, still trying to break his hold on her, pushing against him wherever he touches her. “Blake, you need to wake up. I don’t know how much longer I can keep you still.”

As if coming up for air, Kaidan hears a large gasp, eyelashes fluttering on his cheek as she shoots awake. Kaidan sighs with relief, untangling himself and rolling over. It hasn’t been this bad for her for awhile. He sits up, slipping on his house shoes from the edge of the bed before walking to their shared bathroom. The light hurts his eyes as he flicks it on, causing spots to swim in his vision as he blindly feels around for the bathroom counter. He looks to the floor first, trying to get his eyes to adjust before glancing up to his reflection in the mirror.

His face is a mess. His nose is bent at a wrong angle, blood smeared all over the lower half of his face. He runs some cold water and forms a bowl in his hand that he splashes onto his face. It doesn’t seem to do much good, some of the blood mixture now running down his neck. He grabs a hand towel off the bar and cuts it off before it can go any lower. The towel is light blue, and Kaidan can tell that no amount of soap is going to get these stains off. Gentle as he works, he sets to cleaning off the rest of the blood.

Blake comes in when he’s halfway done, arms pulled into herself as she keeps her gaze low. She takes a seat on the edge of the tub. He catches her thunderstorm eyes tossing glances at him in the mirror. She curls further into herself, her nightshirt, which used to be his college shirt, riding up to show her black underwear underneath. If he looks closely, he can see the seam around each leg where her flesh stops and the robotic pieces of her begin. She’s usually self-conscious about them, but tonight it seems she has other things on her mind.

When she doesn’t speak, he lets her sit in their silence, the faucet turning on and off as he keeps scrubbing at the blood. He listens to her breaths when the faucet is off, the staggered, unevenness of them as she fights to regain control of herself. The fact that she still has nightmares, even two years after the end of the war, hurts Kaidan. He knows there’s nothing he can do to stop them from happening, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to try. With the nightmares, there isn’t even a try available, just a way to handle it for when it does happen.

Kaidan looks back at her in the mirror as he wipes up the last bit of blood from his face. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“I’m sorry you got hurt because of me.” Blake keeps her eyes down at his feet. Kaidan touches his nose carefully, wincing as he does. Definitely broken. He sighs and kneels down in front of her, leaving the bloody towel at the edge of the sink. He runs his hands along her arms, up to her shoulders. She flinches when he touches her, but he’s past being hurt by her reaction. She can’t help it.

“It’s okay. It’s just a nose. I’ll probably go to the doctors tomorrow, get it looked at.” He brushes the back of his hand along her cheek. She has some of his blood on her face, and he reaches behind him to grab the towel and dab it off. She stares at him while he does it, wide-eyed with storm clouds crashing together inside her. This time, he leaves the towel over the edge of the bathtub. He raises up and brings her forehead to his lips, lingering there for a few minutes. Blake doesn’t move. He sits beside her and leans his head against her knees. “I love you.”

She starts crying; he can feel her body shaking. He wraps an arm around her waist, his thumb drawing circles into her side as he waits. Blake hates crying, and even for as long as they’ve been together, she doesn’t like to let him see it. She draws further into herself, her cries getting more vocal as she muffles them against her skin. Hearing it breaks his heart; he hasn’t figured out yet how exactly to reassure her. Usually she would tell him by now, but not tonight. Tonight, something’s different. Tonight, something’s worse.

“Do you remember that scar I used to have?” Her voice is soft, hoarse from crying. Before Cerberus brought her back, her body was heavily scarred, barely a patch of unmarked skin on her. He thinks that she means the one under her left eye, but then he remembers. It’s been so long since he saw it, since he thought about it, but it was something that stood out the first time he saw her naked. It was a rough, jagged lightning shaped scar that looked to be several years old, but almost seemed to glow on her skin. It ran from her belly button down around her pubic area. He remembers how she squirmed uncomfortably when his fingers grazed it, how she changed the subject every time he brought it up.

“Yes,” he says, kissing her bare leg since the rest of her is still hidden away.

“I dreamt about it tonight.” She lifts her head out of the ball that she’s curled herself in, looking down into his eyes. Her eyes are red and swollen from crying, but he’s surprised to see that anger is in them, a raw anger that he hasn’t seen in her since Mars. He swallows, a little intimidated, but he knows it’s not directed at him. He doesn’t say anything, just keeps circling his thumb into her skin. If she wants to tell him, she will. If she doesn’t, he’s not going to push, even though he is curious as to what made her feel like this.

Blake moves down off of the bathtub is slow, jerky movements. She crawls into his lap and curls back into herself. He wraps his arms around her and leans his head onto her shoulder. She wets her lips before speaking. “There was this guy back in the Reds, Rafe.” Kaidan closes his eyes as he listens, keeping his questions to himself. He can feel her shaking at the mention of his name. “He...he, uh…” She shakes her head. “I can’t.”

Kaidan kisses her shoulder. “You don’t have to tell me.”

She clenches her hands. “I want to,” she spits. “It’s been years! I should be able to talk about this, with you.” Anger burns brighter inside of her. “It shouldn’t be this fucking hard.”

Kaidan waits. Blake huffs. He watches her try to sort out where to start, what to say. “Rafe was… older. He’d been in and out of the clink a few times, but he was…” Blake closes her eyes, trying to concentrate. “He brought drugs into the Reds, started forcing the rest of us to deal. I tried to get out. _I tried_.” The anger falls away and Kaidan sees how she must’ve looked back then; scared, hurting, alone. She never talks with him about her days out on the streets, and he’s a little surprised that she’s saying something now.

Tears are coming again, and he holds her to him, patient for her to continue on. He can imagine how that plays out in his own mind, but he doesn’t tell her his assumptions. “Rafe...he’s stronger than me.” She catches herself. “Was. He was stronger than me.” She looks over to Kaidan. “I didn’t kill him. I wanted to so bad. I always said I would, but someone else got to him first...I know you were thinking that.”

He laces his fingers together with hers, bringing it up to his lips. “I wasn’t.”

“Then you’re stupid.” She yanks her hand back. “I would’ve killed him in an instant if I had that chance. I wouldn’t have hesitated.” She turns away from him and lays her face down onto her knees. “He kept me locked in a cell, called me his little _pet_. Twisted fuck.” She’s quivering as she recounts, but Kaidan can’t tell if this is more tears or just raw anger. “There weren’t a lot of women in the Reds, and the ones that were there tended to disappear.” Dread pools in Kaidan’s stomach. It dawns on him what she’s saying, what happened to her back then. A part of him wants to stop her from talking, to make her shut up before she puts the words out there, but he knows that she needs this. It’s obvious that this is the first time she’s ever told anyone about it, and he alternates listening to her speak and trying to quiet the loud drums in his ears.

“I never even asked why.” She brings her hand back to Kaidan’s without looking at him, tugging it toward her. “Curiosity doesn’t serve you well in the Reds, but then I knew. I knew and I didn’t go back to help anyone else after I got free. I left them alone with him. I knew what he did and still, I left them.” She starts crying again, pressing his hand against her lips as she does so. His finger reaches back to wipe a tear from her eye. He wants to tell her that there was nothing she could do, she was so young. He doesn’t want to speak out of place though, and keeps silent.

Her muffled voice chokes in the middle of her sobs, his heart dropping at her words. “He...he, uh...he... raped...” she cries, body heaving as she tries to find a way to keep breathing amidst her tears, unable to finish her statement. “He’d put on these shows in front of the other members of the crew, and then he’d give me to them.” Kaidan locks her in her arms, trying to fight back his own tears. He was pissed. How could someone do something so awful to her, to a child? Kaidan thinks that Rafe is lucky he’s already dead, because he would kill him, making sure that he felt every fucking second of his death.

Blake feels so fragile in his arms, and his anger and revulsion quickly shifts to heartache. Blake has had to live with this for so many years now. He wonders how many of her nightmares have been due to this, how many times he’s looked at her and seen the stone set in her face; was it because of this? He leans her into his chest, sprinkling kisses over the crown of her head. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m so sorry.”

And his wife, for the first time since he’s known her, uncurls herself and wraps her arms around his back, burying her face into his chest. He’s never been able to get her to come out of her shell after she’s balled herself up. She’s always been unbreachable when she’s been at her most vulnerable. He pats her back, pressing her into him. He’s safety, he wants to tell her. He’s safety and he’ll protect her. He’ll keep her safe and he loves her. Nothing bad is going to happen when he’s around, he promises. He wants to tell her this, swear to her that he’s got her for whatever she needs him for, whatever she needs him to do, but they would both know that his kindness can only extend so far. Nightmares are a force that not even his love can save her from.

**Author's Note:**

> All of my Blake fics are named after Nine Inch Nails lyrics. Sorry not sorry. This one was taken from [Hurt by NIN](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prDoGmY5kj8), also covered by [Johnny Cash](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt1Pwfnh5pc). Both versions are good. 
> 
> This was supposed to be short. Oops. The rest of the MERweek prompts can be found on my tumblr under the same name.


End file.
